Anyway, when I got an offer for an anti-chafing cream towards the end of April from a chap called Robert, I did agree. It was shipped from New Zealand, but they sent it for free and it arrived some time in May. With the Cork marathon just a couple of weeks away, it was good timing. I usually use vaseline, which works reasonably well, even for 24 hour races, but has a few drawbacks - it's greasy and it leaves stains on your clothes. I find bodyglide too expensive in our local shop but I would certainly consider an alternative.
When opening the container, the first thing that hit me was the smell. It was much stronger than anticipated and reminded me of bees wax. Niamh was a lot less kind, however ("more like horse sh*t!"). Looking at the label proved me right, it is made of manuka oil, beeswax and lanolin and there is no mention of horse dung.
The consistency is more solid than vaseline and it is not greasy at all, so that's a plus. However, the one and only fact I was interested in was how it work against chafing.
Apart from the Cork marathon I had an immediate need for an anti-chafing product in a rather unusual area. After wearing my HR chest strap for 24 hours in Turin I was left with a big red itchy stripe across my chest as if a tiger had caressed me with some tough love. Subsequent runs with the same HR strap were rather uncomfortable at times and my skin just would not improve. Vaseline was not the answer and plasters did not work either, and on a couple of occasions in previous years I ended up running without HR for a couple of weeks, something I would prefer to avoid as I do use my HR data for training feedback a lot.
The instructions on the tin say "apply liberally to all chafe prone areas". Actually, I found that a liberal coating left a strange white residue on the HR strap after the run, which does not happen if I only use small amounts. Apart from that (and I managed to wipe that residue away), it worked extremely well, my tiger stripe got immediately better and had more or less disappeared within a week or two.
The Cork marathon was run in heavy rain at times, which makes the skin very prone to possible chafing, and the cream came through that tough test with flying colours. I had no problems whatsoever, though to be fair I would have expected vaseline to work just as well.
I got used to the smell very quickly, and in fact quite like it by now. As a product it works very well, definitely the best anti-chafing product I have used so far. The one thing that would put me off is the price, a look at their website says one container costs a whopping €22.90! I would expect 100g to last me for maybe a year, so it's still affordable, but still.
But, you know, if you get a kindly offer like I did I strongly suggest you say yes.
23 quid! I almost spilled my tea. If they could match bodyglide per 100 grams I'd give it a try. I've had chest strap chafing on the long rides.
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